Other sources of discontent, very common indeed, are the little cross purposes of husband and wife in common conversation; a disposition in either to criticise and question whatever the other says; a desire always to demonstrate and make him feel himself in the wrong, especially in sympathy. Nothing is so goading on the part of either. Much better, therefore, if our companion views a thing in a light different from what we do, to leave him in quiet possession of his view. What is the use of rectifying him if the thing be unimportant; and if important, let it pass for the present and wait for a softer moment and more conciliatory occasion of revising the subject together. It is wonderful how many persons are rendered unhappy by inattention to these rules of prudence.

A PARABLE.

"O dear, I am so tired of Sunday!" So said Willie, a playful little boy, who was longing for the Sabbath to be over, that he might return to his

amusements.

"Who wants to hear a story?" said a kind friend who was present. "I, sir," "and I," "and I," said the children, as they gathered around him. Then he told them a parable. Our Saviour, when he was on earth, often taught the people by parables. The parable told the little boys was of a kind man, who had some very rich apples hanging on a tree. A poor man was passing by the house of the owner, and stopped to admire this beautiful apple-tree. He counted these rich golden pippinsthere were just seven of them. The rich owner could afford to give them away; and it gave him so much pleasure to make this poor man hap. py that he called him and said:

"My friend, I will give you a part of my fruit." So he held out his

hand and received six of the apples. The owner had kept one for himself.

Do you think the poor man was grateful for his kindness? No, indeed. He wanted the seven pippins all to himself, and at last he made up his mind that he would watch his opportunity, and go back and steal the cther apple.

"Did he do that?" said Willie, very indignantly. "He ought to have been ashamed of himself, and I hope that he got well punished for stealing that apple."

"How many days are there in a week, Willie?" said his friend.

"Seven," said Willie, blushing deeply, for now he began to understand the parable, and he felt an uneasy sensation at his heart. Conscience began to wisper to him, "And ought not a boy to be ashamed of himself who is unwilling on the seventh day to lay aside his amusements? Ought not he to be punished if he will not remember the Sabbath day to keep it holy?"

A GOOD RESOLUTION. A young lady rose in a meeting recently, and in a low, clear voice, betraying profound feeling, said, "I have taken for my New Year text these words of scripture: Whatsoever He saith unto you, do it.' I have taken this, not only to apply to testifying in a place like this, as opportunity offers, but also to the performance of little home and household duties every day; a task not always so easy in these days of attractive Christian activities in the outside world. To this text I have added

this, 'Strengthened with all might, according to His glorious power.' Obeying, in His strength the first, and trusting implicitly the second, I enter with a glad heart the unknown path of the new year." Happy heart! to have found in early life the way of rest and strength and usefulness.

VIRTUE is every where the same, because it comes from God, while everything else is of men.-Voltaire.

FLOWERS are the universal moralists not one but has its lesson, its sermon or its song.

HAPPINSES is a perfume that one canhot shed over another without drops falling on one's self.

To endeavor to work upon the vulgar with fine sense is like attempt. ing to hew blocks with a razor.—Pope.

A MAN cannot possess anything that is better than a good woman, nor anything worse than a bad one. --Simonides.

WHEN Socrates was asked why he had built for himself so small a house, "Small as it is," he replied, "I wish I I could fill it with friends."

A FALSE friend is like a shadow on a dial which appears in fine weather, but vanishes at the approach of a cloud.

VALUE the friendship of him who stands by you in the storm; swarms of insects will surround you in the sunshine.

NOTHING So adorns the face as

cheerfulness. When the heart is in flower, its bloom and beauty pass to the features.

A CHARACTER which combines the love of enjoyment with the love of duty, and the ability to perform it, is the one whose unfoldings gives the greatest promise of perfection.

GOODNESS of heart is man's best treasure, his brightest honor, and wisest acquisition. It is a ray of divinity that dignifies humanity, at

tracts admiration, and assimilates him to his Creator; but like pure gold, is liable to be counterfeited.

IN LIGHTER VEIN.

WHEN the Irishman first tried peaches, he said he liked the flavor but the seeds lay hard on his stomach.

"I AM surprised my dear, that I have never seen you blush." "The fact is, husband, I was born to blush unseen."

AN Irishman complained to his physician that he stuffed him so much with drugs, that he was sick a long time after he got well.

A WIT once asked a peasant what part he played in the great drama of life. "I mind my own business," was the reply.

A BRIDGEPORT cat was in the cellar one day, and, seeing a crab, went up to examine it. A moment later the cat was helping the crab up the stairs at the rate of a mile a minute. To a crab such a rate of speed must have appeared something unusual.

"Go to grass!" said a mother to her daughter. "Well, then, I sup pose I'll have to marry," ejaculated the fair damsel. "Why so?" inquired the astonished mother. cause all men are grass." lady gave it up.

"Be

"" The old

"My deceased uncle," says a humorous writer, "was the most polite gentleman in the world. He was making a voyage on the Danube, and the boat sunk. My uncle was just on the point of drowning. He got his head above water for once, took off his hat and said, 'Ladies and gentlemen, will you please excuse me? and down he went."

OFFICE OF MANFORD'S MAGAZINE.

Chicago, Ill., No. 774 W. Van Buren St., to which all letters should be addressed, for the present.

REV. T. H. TABOR, Editor and Publisher.

THE MAGAZINE.

TERMS OF THE MAGAZINE are the same as usual, $1.50 per annum. NO DISCONTINUANCES until all arrearages are settled.

THE TENDENCY OF THE HOUR.

Twenty-two years ago we published an article, under the above caption, in the New Covenant, in which we uttered a word of warning. We thought we saw the seeds of an unprofitable harvest, among some of the young ministers of our church. That harvest is now filling our religious press with controversy. It was a manifest inclination to make their own reason the only ground of their faith and responsibility..

A short time after (Feb. 23, 1867), a fiery reply was published in the same paper, from the pen of Rev. C. Fluher, which contains some statements which we desire to put in contrast with the recent utterances of the same gentleman. We had said that the tendency was towards s the denial of Christ, as an authoritative teacher of truth.

Mr. Fluher then said (he had not then become a D. D.): "As a matter of fact, are our young ministers in danger of this denial? We contend that none are more firmly rooted in the essentials of Christianity. None believe in Christ more strongly or vividly. They do hold him

to be of special divine appointment, and the Son of God. Far from denying miracles, with Renan and Paker, as our friend inferentially charges, they take Bushnell's ground, that Christ wrought them by means of an acquaintance with higher forces than we see in natural operation— forces coming into this world from a su perior realm.”

This was Mr. Fluher's statement twenty-two years ago. His lastest statement, is in these words: "I believe that Jesus was divine as I hold, that human nature, properly understood, is. The stories of miracles are the legends which have grown up around his simple figure-the work of mistaken friends."

We give this contrast that the reader may see which way Mr. Fluher is progressing, and how completely our opinion of the tendency of the hour has been realized in the experience of the man, who tried to prove that our opinion was groundless.

GOODNESS EVERYTHING.

That goodness (moral goodness we mean) is everything in this world, is to us a truth self-evident. Yet an able man who lost his way amid conflicting opinions, and was for a time an infidel, says: "No one taught us that goodness was beauty, that goodness was greatness, that goodness was glory, that goodness was happiness, that goodness was heaven. The truth was never pressed upon us that the want of goodness was deformity, dishonor and shame-that goodness in full measure would make heaven-that its decline and disappearance would make earth hell, yet a careful study of

the Scriptures for many years have left the impression upon my mind, that this is really the case. When I compared the eternal talk about all of our goodness being of no account in the sight of God, of all our righteousness being but as filthy rags, with the teaching of the Scriptures, I felt as if theologians were anti-Christ, and their theology the gospel of the wicked one."

There has been far too much of this diabolical gospel preached in this world, for welfare of the world. It has made good men and women sad, and strengthened the souls of the wicked by promising them life for simply singing the song: "Jesus paid it all,

All the debt I owe."

EDITORIAL JOTTINGS.

-In our first article in this number of our Magazine, we present the waste of souls proposed by the doctrine of endless sin and suffering, as an unanswerable argument against its truth. And we ask attention to it with more confidence, because, in several instances during our personal ministry, it has produced conviction when every other argument had failed.

-A Christian philosopher (Mr. Ballanche), speaking of his approaching death, said: “I shall fall asleep on the bosom of a great hope." He did so die. And what can exceed the victory of such a departure?

-Exposure is the first step towards reform, as a disease must be known to exist before a remedy will be thought of, or can be applied. On this account, the discussion that is now in progress in our papers in relation to the truth of the New Testament record, will prove a source of great good in the end.

-We are requested to say that Rev. Abner Vedder may be addressed until further notice at Osseo, Trempealeau county, Wis. He is preaching there once a month.

-Men talk of hope and comfort in the doctrine of endless torment; but hope and comfort are strangers to that doctrine, and always have been.

-The simple thought that the Almighty Father sent his Son to reconcile the world to himself, and was in his Son aiding the work, and yet may fail to reconcile millions on millions of men, is simply blasphemy.

-As long as sin lingers in a single heart, so long will a child of God be lost from home, and the song of the ninety and nine cannot be sung in heaven.

-When a tree is putting forth leaves, it will not bleed if it is pruned; and so when the Christian is putting forth good works, he will not weep if the pruning hand of Providence should touch him.

--Whoever denies that spite of all hindrances from individual wickedness, the right shall not ultimately prevail, impugns not only human justice, but the justice of God.

-Nothing can refute the testimony of the Bible, that when God chastens, it is still love, not hatred, that wields the Scourge; the indissoluble connection between wrong doing and wretchedness is everywhere affirmed, but not the infinite, endless, useless, wretchedness of a single soul--no never.

-Rev. Dr. Bartol says, that "the miracles of Christ were as full of reason and goodness as they are of power. By their pure and lofty character they nourish and edify the soul."

-Our debt to God is not only for his bestowment of the pearl of great price, but for his sure conservation in a casket, that cannot be broken, of what he has be stowed.

-The extraordinary displays of good, ness and power in the Christian miracles, authenticate and confirm forever the messages of the divine mind and will, and illustrate the depths and far-reaching tenderness of God's love to his human children, and the crowning miracle of all,

in the resurrection of Jesus, is the special assurance of our personal immortality.

-When a person who has lived solely for the world, its pleasures and show, says that he has not faith in immortality, we are not surprised. On the contrary, we should be surprised if he had. Such faith does not grow on such soil as he has cultivated, nor under such nurture as he has bestowed.

-What is called the liberal party, in our church, are seeking to take revelation down from the everlasting heights, where it was set by the hand of God, to be a light and guide and comfort to man, and make it a candle lighted by the discovery of man and raised from the earth.

-By the kindness of a friend who was formerly a publisher, we are enabled to give a fine illustration of Home, Sweet Home, in our Home Department this month.

-We publish notices of the Missouri Convention and the Lower Wabash Association, in this issue. The space we give Br. Bendixon's excellent letter, prevents our publishing the programme of he Association.

MINISTERIAL ARROGANCE.

The historian Robertson relates that when the barbarians who overrun the Roman Empire, first embraced the Christian faith, they found the clergy in possession of considerable power; and they naturally transferred to those new guides the profound submission and reverence which they were accustomed to yield to the priests of that religion which they had forsaken. They deemed their persons to be equally sacred with their functions; and would have considered it as impious to subject them to the profane jurisdiction of laity. The clergy were not blind to these advantages which the weakness of mankind afforded them. They established courts in which every question relating to their characters, their functions or their property, were

tried. History of Charles V, pages 34 and 35.

And some of this ministerial arrogance is occasionally seen in the world still. It is by no means an unheard of thing for ministers to treat the conduct of the members of their own profession in a very different manner from what they would treat a layman guilty of the same offense, under the plea of taking a judicial view of the case.

We know of a case where a man who had left the ministry to escape discipline, was put back into the ministry on this plea, of a judicial view of the case; when an impartial judge of the court of long experience, and great reputation for ability and candor, said upon reading the testimony in the case: "It would be a public misfortune to have such a man put back into the ministry of any church."

IS THE RECORD TRUE? DEAR BROTHER TABOR:

Although comparatively speaking-a new convert to Universalism-allow me to say a few words touching the great and all absorbing question which at present is being discussed in our church. I have since I became a Universalistearnestly and honestly and prayerfully read and studied the theology of our church in the light of the Bible, and I am glad to testify to-day, that I am more confirmed than ever in that faith which "cast out all fear," in that love "which thinketh no evil," and in that hope which shall not "make me ashamed "—although I have hope for the whole human race.

But I must confess I did not think that any such doctrine as the one the rationalists are fighting for, had any room within our borders. I had no idea that such doctrines would be tolerated inside of a Christian church, when preached and published and urged upon the members of such church.

It was with deep pain I heard certain "papers" read at our last "ministers' in